What is ‘predation’? Explain with the help of suitable examples why is it required in a community with rich biodiversity?
Answers
Explanation:
Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey.
Answer:
Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill the host) and parasitoidism (which always does, eventually).
• Predator plays an important role in energy transfer from one trophic level to the next trophic level. They keep the prey population under control.
• In agricultural pest control, adopted Biological control methods are based on the ability of the predator to regulate the prey population.
• Predators also help in balancing species diversity in a community, by reducing the intensity of competition among competing prey species.
• For example, in the rocky intertidal communities of the American Pacific Coast, the starfish Pisaster is an important predator. In an experimental study, when all the starfish were removed from a particular enclosed seashore area, within a year more than ten invertebrate species became extinct, due to interspecific competition.